UN: Romanian Ambassador invites states to contribute to the Instrument for Reporting Military Expenditures

Romania's representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Ion Jinga, who opened the Convention on Conventional Weapons, of the First Committee of the General Assembly of the United Nations, in his capacity as President of the Group of Governmental Experts (GEG) that assesses the reporting by UN member states of their military expenditures, reads a release of the Permanent Mission of Romania to the UN on Saturday remitted to AGERPRES. 

The Romanian official presented the GEG works concluded in July 2017, based on which it was drafted the United Nations Report of Military Expenditures. 

Thus, Romania's Permanent Representative hailed the historical adoption, without voting, of the resolution on "Objective information on military matters, including transparency of military expenditures," which constitutes the mandate for the Standardized Instrument for Reporting Military Expenditures (MilEk). The adoption of this resolution confirms how important the international community believes this instrument of transparency is. 

While voicing the Group's concern regarding the downward trend seen in the reporting activity of military expenditures of member states, the Romanian Ambassador invited more states to bring their contribution to this instrument, otherwise risking to lose their capacity of promoting transparency and building trust. At the same time, Ambassador Jinga underscored that as consistent their participation in MilEK is, as more they will contribute to an increase in predictability in the military area, and also to reducing risks of interstate conflicts. 

Moreover, the Permanent Representative of Romania encouraged the UN MB to fill in the questionnaire created by GEG for identifying the causes that led to the decline in number of reporting states. 

During his speech, Ambassador Ion Jinga underscored that a key issue in ensuring the relevance and development of the MilEx instrument is establishing a periodical revision process for it. 

During the meeting, the UN MB voiced their support for increasing transparency in military expenditures as well as in collaboration at international level for demining, disarmament and non-proliferation of conventional weapons. This measures are believed to be crucial in achieving the sustainable development objectives considering their close relation to peace, security and development, says the release.